We were walking through the shadows
of the Adirondacks. I saw so clearly
that unfamiliar country, our sudden friendship.
You said it couldn't be that way again,
walking that field, the small hands of birch leaves
fluttering in the still line of sunset.
The one night without a moon
seems now the end of summer. We walked
down the narrow road to the pond,
apart even from that separate world.
The water was bright with stars,
a crowd of lights gleamed on black.
You said some of those stars
had already burned themselves out,
yet still they lived on the glass surface
of the pond. And I thought, even this landscape
is accidental.
On the last day the weather changed.
We walked past pond and field,
watched the stream mirror the cloudy sky,
variations of sun turning in the water.
The movement of light and shadow changed the rocks
as if by years. We left unexplained
whatever changes in ourselves
and walked back to our deliberate lives.
